Witchcraft of New England Explained by Modern Spiritualism Part 9

p. 287:--

"A letter came from Pispataqua by Mr. Tho. Wiggens. We got Mr. Wiggens to read the letter, and he went his way; and I promised to conceal the letter after it was read to my husband and myself, and we both did conceal it; nevertheless, in a few days after, Goode Morse met me, and clapt me on the back, and said, 'I commend you for sending such an answer to the letter.'

I presently asked her, what letter? Why, said she, hadst not thee such a letter from such a man at such a time? I came home presently and examined my husband about it. My husband presently said, What? Is she a witch or a cunning woman? Whereupon we examined our family, and they said they knew nothing of the letter."

Mrs. Morse's possession of their secret was so unaccountable that the husband in astonishment asked, "Is she a witch or a cunning woman?" The question implies that it seemed so extraordinary to the man that she should have knowledge of the letter and its answer, that any process by which she could obtain it was seemingly beyond the power of mortals to apply. Either witchcraft or supernal cunning must have helped her. When asked by the same Mrs. Mirack afterward "_how_ she came to know it," the witness says, Mrs. Morse "told me she could not tell." This indicates a mind so conditioned, as many mediumistic ones now are, that knowledge is inflowed to them, they know not whence or how, and, literally, they _cannot_ tell whence it has come. This gives presumption that she possessed mediumistic receptivities, and the outworkings from such faculties would suggest that she received supernal aid. The only imagined source of such aid at that day was the devil. Obviously she "felt knowledge in her bones," as the acute negress did in Mrs. Stowe's "Minister's Wooing."

Though Mrs. Morse was tried and condemned for witchcraft, the sentence was never put in execution. When on her way from Ipswich jail to Boston for trial, she said, among other things, that "she was accused about witchcraft, but that she was as clear of it as G.o.d in heaven." When saying this she probably spoke no more than exact truth.

She appears to have been a good woman. The candid and generally cautious Rev. Mr. Hale, of Beverly, wrote that "her husband, who was esteemed a sincere and understanding Christian by those that knew him, desired some neighbor ministers, of whom I was one, to discourse with his wife, which we did; and her discourse _was very Christian_, and still pleaded her innocence as to that which was laid to her charge." This examination occurred after her discharge from prison. The aged couple came out from their severe ordeal with characters bright enough to claim the confidence and respect of good men in their own day, and may claim as much from after ages.

There is no indication that the boy of the house, John Stiles, whom Powell accused as the great mischief-maker, was suspected of being such by any other one of the many witnesses of the strange transactions. Those witnesses were much better judges as to what persons the wonders apparently proceeded from, than any person can be to-day; and one whom they left unblamed, it is distinct injustice, as well as folly, for expounders of the case in our times to put forth and traduce as having been the contriver and performer of all that so agitated, distressed, and exposed the lives of those who sheltered, fed, and kindly cared for him.

Modern historians, however, have been guilty of this great wrong.

It has recently been stated (Woodward's "Hist. Series," No. VIII. p. 141), that, "what instigated him to undertake the tormenting of his grand-parents, there is no mention as yet discovered." This begs the primal question, viz., _Did_ he undertake to torment them? To this inquiry it can truly be said, there is no mention in the primitive records, as yet discovered, that he did. There is no evidence that any one but Caleb Powell (that swift witness) suspected him of undertaking any such thing. Where the records are so extensive and full as in this case, their omission to mention any other accusers of the boy is strong evidence that there was no apparent contriving or executing pranks and outrages by him. The writer above quoted says also, "How long the young scamp carried on his annoyances ... does not appear." Neither does it appear that he ever began or was consciously concerned in any such. Only in appearance, and that only to Caleb Powell the clairvoyant, and to the eyes of modern commentators, was that boy in fault.

Upham, following the witchy Powell's lead, ignorantly regards what was done by mystical use of the boy's properties as being the boy's voluntary performances. And regarding the boy as a great rogue, and as author of all the great mischief, he says (vol. i. p. 448), "His audacious operations were persisted in to the last." We look upon that allegation as an "audacious" defamation of an innocent youth.

In this Morse case we chose to present ostensible and reputed actors, prior to presenting descriptions of the special scenes in which history makes them prominent, because considerable knowledge of the age, character, and abilities pertaining to the chief supposed performers in the great Newbury tragedy, or semi-tragedy, will be helpful, if not essential, to any well-based conclusion as to whether any one of them was the leading intelligence that brought it upon the stage, and supervised and managed its apparent actors--and, if either was, then which one among them? If neither of them, then somebody else was manager there. Our instructive citation from Hazzard discloses the occasional action of agents and forces that are not recognized even to-day by the community at large, and therefore we wished it to be read in advance of facts which it greatly helps to explain. Way is now opened for introducing to those readers whose patience has sustained them through this long prologue, the facts of the case as stated by William Morse himself, and sworn to by both him and his wife.

"THE TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM MORSE: which saith, together with his wife, aged both about sixty-five years: that, Thursday night, being the twenty-seventh day of November, we heard a great noise without, round the house, of knocking of the boards of the house, and, as we conceived, throwing of stones against the house. Whereupon myself and wife looked out and saw n.o.body, and the boy all this time with us; but we had stones and sticks thrown at us, that we were forced to retire into the house again.

Afterward we went to bed, and the boy with us; and then the like noise was upon the roof of the house.

"2. The same night, about midnight, the door being locked when we went to bed, we heard a great hog in the house grunt and make a noise, as we thought willing to get out; and that we might not be disturbed in our sleep, I rose to let him out, and I found a hog in the house and the door unlocked: the door was firmly locked when we went to bed.

"3. The next morning, a stick of links hanging in the chimney, they were thrown out of their place, and we hanged them up again, and they were thrown down again, and some into the fire.

"4. The night following, I had a great awl lying in the window, the which awl we saw fall down out of the chimney into the ashes by the fire.

"5. After this, I bid the boy put the same awl into the cupboard, which we saw done, and the door shut to: this same awl came presently down the chimney again in our sight, and I took it up myself. Again, the same night, we saw a little Indian basket, that was in the loft before, come down the chimney again. And I took the same basket, and put a piece of brick into it, and the basket with the brick was gone, and came down again the third time with the brick in it, and went up again the fourth time, and came down again without the brick; and the brick came down again a little after.

"6. The next day, being Sat.u.r.day, stones, sticks, and pieces of bricks came down so that we could not quietly dress our breakfast; and sticks of fire also came down at the same time.

"7. That day, in the afternoon, my thread four times taken away, and came down the chimney; again my awl and gimlet wanting; again my leather taken away, came down the chimney; again my nails, being in the cover of a firkin, taken away, came down the chimney. Again, the same night, the door being locked, a little before day, hearing a hog in the house, I rose and saw the hog to be mine. I let him out.

"8. The next day, being Sabbath day, many stones, and sticks, and pieces of bricks came down the chimney: on the Monday, Mr. Richardson and my brother being there, the frame of my cowhouse they saw very firm. I sent my boy out to scare the fowls from my hog's meat: he went to the cow-house and it fell down, my boy crying with the hurt of the fall. In the afternoon, the pots hanging over the fire did dash so vehemently one against the other, we set down one, that they might not dash to pieces. I saw the andiron leap into the pot, and dance and leap out; and again leap in and dance, and leap out again, and leap on a table and there abide; and my wife saw the andiron on the table: also I saw the pot turn itself over, and throw down all the water. Again we saw a tray with wool leap up and down, and throw the wool out, and so many times, and saw n.o.body meddle with it. Again, a tub his hoop fly off of itself, and the tub turn over, and n.o.body near it. Again, the woollen wheel turned upside down, and stood up on its end, and a spade set on it: Step. Greenleafe saw it, and myself and my wife. Again, my rope-tools fell down upon the ground before my boy could take them, being sent for them; and the same thing of nails tumbled down from the loft into the ground, and n.o.body near. Again, my wife and the boy making the bed, the chest did open and shut; the bed-clothes could not be made to lie on the bed, but fly off again."

The disturbances commenced Thursday night, November 27; on December 3, six days only from the commencement of the troubles (see Upham, vol. i. p.

439), Powell was complained of before a magistrate, by William Morse, "for suspicion of working with the devil." Powell appeared for a hearing five days later, on the 8th, and the testimony quoted above was, either then or at the time of the complaint on the 3d, submitted before Jo. Woodbridge, _commissioner_. Therefore the facts were of such recent occurrence as to be fresh in the memory of the deponent; and his prompt suspicion of Powell gives probability to the correctness of the statement in Woodward's Series, that when Powell came to the house, pots, kettles, and chairs "resumed" their action "with more vigor than ever." Powell's presence was helpful to the performance. But the whole of Morse's testimony is not embraced in the preceding. There is extant

"A FURTHER TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM MORSE AND HIS WIFE," as follows:--

"We saw a keeler of bread turn over against me, and struck me, not any being near it, and so overturned. I saw a chair standing in the house, and not anybody near. It did often bow toward me, and rise up again. My wife also being in the chamber, the chamber door did violently fly together, not anybody being near it. My wife going to make a bed, it did move to and fro, not anybody being near it. I also saw an iron wedge and spade was flying out of the chamber on my wife, and _did not strike her_. My wife going into the cellar, a drum, standing in the house, did roll over the door of the cellar; and being taken up again, the door did violently fly down again. My barn-doors four times unpinned, I know not how. I, going to shut my barn-door, looking for the pin--the boy being with me--as I did judge, the pin, coming down out of the air, did fall down near to me.

"Again: Caleb Powell came in as aforesaid, and seeing our spirits very low by the sense of our great affliction, began to bemoan our condition, and said that he was troubled for our afflictions, and said that he had eyed this boy, and drawed near to us with great compa.s.sion: 'Poor old man, poor old woman! This boy is the occasion of your grief; for he hath done these things, and hath caused his good old grandmother to be counted a witch.'

'Then,' said I, 'how can all these things be done by him?' Said he, 'Although he may not have done all, yet most of them; for this boy is a young rogue, a vile rogue. I have watched him and see him do things as to come up and down.' Caleb Powell also said he had understanding in Astrology and Astronomy, and knew the working of spirits, some in one country and some in another; and, looking on the boy, said, 'You young rogue to begin so soon. Goodman Morse, if you be willing to let me have this boy, I will undertake you shall be free from any trouble of this kind while he is with me.' I was very unwilling at the first, and my wife; but, by often urging me, till he told me wither and what employment and company he should go, I did consent to it, and this was before Jo. Badger came; and we have been freed from any trouble of this kind ever since that promise, made on Monday night last, to this time being Friday in the afternoon. Then we heard a great noise in the other room, oftentimes, but, looking after it, could not see anything; but, afterward looking into the room, we saw a board hanged to the press. Then we, being by the fire, sitting in a chair, my chair often would not stand still, but ready to throw me backward oftentimes. Afterward, my cap almost taken off my head three times. Again, a great blow on my poll, and my cat did leap from me into the chimney-corner. Presently after, this cat was thrown at my wife.

We saw the cat to be ours; we put her out of the house, and shut the door.

Presently the cat was throwed into the house. We went to go to bed.

Suddenly--my wife being with me in bed, the lamp-light by our side--my cat again throwed at us five times, jumping away presently into the floor; and one of those times, a red waistcoat throwed on the bed, and the cat wrapped up in it. Again, the lamp standing by us on the chest, we said it should stand and burn out; but presently was beaten down, and all the oil shed, and we left in the dark. Again--a great voice, a great while very dreadful. Again--in the morning, a great stone, being six-pound weight, did move from place to place; we saw it. Two spoons throwed off the table, and presently the table throwed down. And, being minded to write, my ink-horn was hid from me, which I found covered with a rag, and my pen quite gone. I made a new pen; and while I was writing, one ear of corn hit me in the face, and fire, sticks, and stones throwed at me, and my pen brought to me. While I was writing with my new pen, my ink-horn taken away; and not knowing how to write any more, we looked under the table and there found him; and so I was able to write again. Again--my wife her hat taken from her head, sitting by the fire by me, the table almost thrown down. Again--my spectacles thrown from the table, and thrown almost into the fire by me, and my wife, and the boy. Again--my book of all my accounts thrown into the fire, and had been burnt presently, if I had not taken it up. Again--boards taken off a tub, and set upright by themselves; and my paper, do what I could, hardly keep it while I was writing this relation, and things thrown at me while a-writing. Presently, before I could dry my writing, a Mormouth hat rubbed along it; but I held so fast that it did blot but some of it. My wife and I, being much afraid that I should not preserve it for public use, did think best to lay it in the Bible, and it lay safe that night. Again--the next day I would lay it there again; but in the morning, it was not there to be found, the bag hanged down empty; but after was found in a box alone. Again--while I was writing this morning, I was forced to forbear writing any more, I was so disturbed with so many things constantly thrown at me."

Such is the account given by an eye and ear witness, who had as good opportunities to receive sensible demonstration of acts performed as can well be imagined. Did he see, hear, and feel all that he testifies to? Has he left record of a series of facts, or only of fictions which he set forth as facts? Was he a faithful and true witness, or not? Who and what was he? An aged shoemaker, who ran the gantlet of a fierce witchcraft ordeal and came out with character sound and untarnished; a man who "was esteemed a sincere and understanding Christian by those that knew him."

The strong words in his favor, which came from such a trustworthy scribe as the Rev. Mr. Hale, on an occasion when circ.u.mstances would influence him to be careful and exact in expression, are clearly indicative that Morse's testimony was probably true and discriminative. "A sincere and _understanding_ Christian." What qualities give better _a priori_ promise of correct testimony than do sincerity and a sound understanding? Where these combine, their utterances imperatively claim very respectful hearing by any one who is in pursuit of positive facts pertaining to human experience. The history of him and his family, during those ten or eleven days and nights through which they were enveloped in the waters of mystery, trouble, and consternation, gives no indication that Mr. Morse's reason ever yielded its normal and just sway over his actions or his words--no indication of his being blinded by any excessive or bewildering excitement or enthusiasm. The fact that he himself wrote out with his own hand, and in the very midst of the startling and hair-lifting phenomena, a narrative of events which gives dates, occurrences, and experiences clearly, in perspicuous and often terse language, accompanied by appropriate specifications of circ.u.mstances which elucidate the character of the whole scene, bespeaks a straightforward, truthful, unexaggerating mind, self-controlled, and moving straight forward in an honest statement of events actually witnessed. Our ancient records contain few testimonies that exhibit clearer or stronger internal evidences of exact.i.tude and reliability than that of William Morse. The form, language, and tone of his account are all in favor of his intelligence, discrimination, and credibility; so much so, that, taken in connection with his whole character, we can conceive of no objection to crediting his narration, excepting what shall be wrung out from the nature and kind of facts he swore to. But neither their nature nor source was concern of his, _as a witness_; and his own sound _understanding_ perceiving this, kept him back from expressing any surmises or innuendoes as to who were the actual authors of his great annoyances. The man understood his position as a witness, kept his reason at the helm throughout the fearful storm, and suspected and accused, not the little boy, but Powell. Obviously his own senses, unbeclouded by the mists of unreasoning excitement, had witnessed the facts he stated, and he knew that they had occurred. His testimony is true.

How can the occurrence of such facts be explained, or rather _who_ produced them? Historians say that the little boy, John, did. How could he? Had history-weaving heads, when at work in the quiet study, been as clear and as free from the blinding action of foregone conclusions, as was that of Mr. Morse amid the flying missiles about his head while he was writing, their reason, as his did, would have asked their witness Powell, "How _could_ all these things be done by him," the boy? And the cowed witness would have replied to them in the nineteenth century as he did to Morse in the seventeenth, "Although he may not have done _all_, yet, most of them." He would have backed down before the historians as he did before the better "understanding" of Mr. Morse. Obviously to common sense, the boy was incompetent to perform a t.i.the of what was ascribed to him. No one but Powell accused him. The age of that boy is not given. He is not known to have been called upon as a witness, and Powell says to him, "You young rogue, to begin so soon." These facts, together with the absence of any words spoken by him to any one, excepting on a single occasion, lead naturally to the inference that he was quite young, and perhaps also that he was apparently inactive. At no age in boyhood, nor yet in manhood, could a single performer, or a host of men, have accomplished by un.o.bservable processes and forces all that is distinctly stated to have been performed in and around the house of William Morse.

Any designation of its source which avows the mischief to have come primarily from the mind of little John Stiles, by necessary implication impeaches Mr. Morse's powers of perception and observation, and the worth of his testimony. It indirectly, at least, accuses him of a great blunder when he suspected Powell rather than little John. On the hypothesis of modern historians, the sedate old man--the "understanding Christian"--was but making much ado about nothing, or next to that; for the little boy was not competent to much. So little could he do alone, that, were he the chief deviser and performer, Mr. Morse was incompetent to distinguish with common acuteness between the ordinary and the marvelous, or else he was an egregious fictionist and impostor. Far, far better would it be both for himself and his readers if the historic instructor recognized, and based his inferences upon, facts well attested, and sought for agents and forces adequate to manifest such results as were evolved. Vastly better would be history when founded upon broad comprehension of existing agents and forces, and a firm basis in the nature of things spreading out wide enough to underlie each and all of the ancient marvels, and admitting an imputation of them to authors whose inherent powers could bring them out to distinct cognition by human senses, than it can be when it ruthlessly pares down the dimensions of facts, dwarfs their fair import, and impeaches the trustworthiness of those who solemnly attested to the truth of descriptions which have come down from former generations! Better, much better would it be to honor the fathers by omitting to undermine and topple over their strong powers and good traits of character, and perversely bring their positive knowledge, gained through the senses, down to the lower level on which modern speculation obtains convictions!

Descent to free and reiterated insinuations and allegations that the best individuals and communities of old were infatuated, credulous, deluded, stultified, because some of their statements and actions are unexplainable by our theories and philosophies, is unbecoming any generous and philanthropic spirit. Fair play calls for frank admission that giant facts occurred of old,--facts so huge that they cannot be stretched at full length upon the beds of modern science and philosophy, nor be wrapped up in the narrow blankets now in fashion,--facts so huge that they cannot squeeze themselves through, nor be forced through, the narrow entrance doors of some modern mental chambers. Does the hugeness which debars them from entering contracted domiciles to-day prove their existence to be but fabulous? Surely not. The sagacity and truthfulness of our predecessors were sound and good. They recorded facts. Shame be to those who are ashamed to admit that their equals in mental acuteness and accuracy of statement may, of old, actually have witnessed genuine phenomena which justified their descriptions. To brand the events as being the products of fraud, credulity, and infatuation, because only modern limitations to nature's permissions and powers render them unexplainable as facts, is shameful.

Newbury, in 1679-80, was obviously visited and disturbed by giants. To deem that the biggest of these were children of little John Stiles, is not only farcical in the extreme, but it necessarily, however indirectly, asperses good William Morse, that "sincere and understanding Christian,"

and also his equally good wife, who pa.s.sed through the severe ordeals of witchcraft scenes and persecutions, and came forth untarnished,--asperses them by an imputation of incompetency to observe and describe with average clearness and accuracy events that pa.s.sed before their eyes,--incompetency to give a truthful and unexaggerated account of what they saw.

Every sentiment of justice begs for a tongue with which to rebuke the sneers that overweeningly wise witchcraft historians have cast upon the senses and the mental and moral states of the observers and describers of the great marvels of former days. The foul broods of harpy adjectives which history has sent forth to prey upon the vitals of good characters for truthfulness and discrimination, should be forced to unloose their talons, and hie themselves back to roost where they were hatched.

a.s.suming, as the histories of all nations in all ages and lands indicate, and as many tested modern workers demonstrate, that some disembodied, unseen intelligences can at times either banish from the human body, or put in abeyance, or irresistibly control, the mental, affectional, and moral powers of some impressible human beings, and also use their whole physical structures and nerve elements as instruments; a.s.suming, further, both that such unseen workers may have been the actual authors of many startling phenomena which the preceding pages have brought up before the reader's mind, and that Mrs. Morse, Caleb Powell, and the boy were each of them mediumistical, contributing to the performance of the wonders--a.s.suming this, the proximity of those several persons to the spots where the marvels appeared, would subject them all to rigid scrutiny, and their movements or their positions would probably, at times, indicate to external senses that they were somehow actors in the _melee_.

They were obviously unconscious reservoirs of the forces there used, and as such were all involved in the production of the great mischief. It is credible, yes, quite probable, that the little boy was actually seen by Powell enacting a prominent part; but that Powell, who then saw, was practically a spirit, beholding a spirit form like in all things to the boy, but moved, energized, and controlled, all imperceptibly to external vision, by disembodied spirits. At the very time when all merely external beholders saw the external boy standing about the room in quiet and repose, or sitting still in the corner, spirit vision might have seen his semblance being used for infiltrating seeming life, motive powers, and longings for a lively jig and a merry time generally into the whole group of household utensils and supplies. When dead wood and iron, when leather and wool, when sausages and bread, when an iron wedge and a spade, find legs, and arms, and wings,--when such become things of seeming life, of forceful life, too, and of self-guiding actions,--they preach with power which no mere human tongue can command. No eloquence from its common sources can equal theirs in forcing conviction. They say "unseen intelligences move us"--"unseen intelligences move us," and every self-possessed and logical hearer responds, Amen.

All things have their use. This case of seemingly low as well as rough manifestations, where spirits exhibited the effects of their force mainly upon gross, lifeless matter and brute animals, shows more forcibly and convincingly, if possible, the fact of supermundane agents, than did the effective hands, and simples, and clear visions of Margaret Jones; the "wit" or clairaudience of Ann Hibbins; the Dutch tones and unconscious utterances of Ann Cole, or the contortions of Elizabeth Knap, and the words of the pretty black boy. Life and self-action in dead wood and iron are phenomena too striking and pregnant with meaning to be wisely slurred or ignored.

Ess.e.x County has been the theater of several exhibitions of astounding marvels. The performances detailed in this chapter beyond question excited fears and disturbed peace throughout Newbury and its surrounding towns.

Also an apparitional boy has recently shown himself to a teacher and her pupils in Newburyport, to the no small disturbance of that place. During the first decade of the present century, famous Moll Pitcher, who, as Upham says, "_derived her mysterious gifts by inheritance_, her grandfather having practiced them before in Marblehead," practiced fortune-telling and kindred arts at the base of High Rock, in Lynn, where "she read the future, and traced what to mere mortals were the mysteries of the present or the past...." so successfully, or at least so notoriously, that "her name has everywhere become the generic t.i.tle of fortune-tellers." In that county, too, the mysteries and horrors of Salem witchcraft were encountered. But scarcely any other event in that territory seems more highly charged with the elements of incredibility than the Salem historian's perception that little John Stiles was the _bona fide_ author of the pranks played at William Morse's house. No cotemporary of the boy, excepting impressible, wayward Powell, seems ever to have suspected the little one as being the giant rogue. How blind, therefore, were the eyes of all others of that generation! For now an historic eye, looking back through the darkening mists of eight score years and twenty miles north, absolutely sees _audacity_ and action, which all living eyes, alert and vigilant on the spot and at the time, were incompetent to detect. The world progresses; new clairvoyance has been developed--clairvoyance which sees what never existed--to wit, little John Stiles as the designing and conscious enactor of superhuman works.

Very many modern scenes rival this ancient one at Newbury in the roughnesses of manifestations and the difficulty of fathoming the purposes and characters of the performers. Perhaps no other one of them is more worthy of attention or more instructive than the prolonged one which occurred at the residence of Rev. Eliakim Phelps, D. D., at Stratford, Conn., 1850. In "Modern Spiritualism, its Facts and Fanaticisms," by E.

W. CAp.r.o.n (Bela Marsh, Boston, 1855), page 132, commences a very lucid and authentic account of this case, covering nearly forty pages. The character and position of Dr. Phelps, who furnished Cap.r.o.n with his facts, and whose permission was obtained for their publication, make the account referred to well worthy of careful perusal. On several different occasions, years ago, it was our privilege to hold familiar conversations with Dr. Phelps upon the subject of Spiritualism, and his details of spirit performances in his presence prepared is to view him as having transmitted to his offspring properties which were very helpful in setting THE GATES AJAR.

THE GOODWIN FAMILY.

In the family of John Goodwin, of Boston, in 1688, four children, all young, were simultaneously either sorely afflicted or set themselves to playing pranks and tricks with diabolical furore. Which? An elaborate account of what was either imposed upon them by other beings, or of what themselves devised and enacted, was promptly written out by Cotton Mather, who was an observer of many of the marvels while they were transpiring.

Poole, in "Genealogical and Antiquarian Register," October, 1870, says those children were "Martha, aged 13; John, 11; Mercy, 7; Benjamin 5."

Drake, in "Annals of Witchcraft," says they were "Nathaniel, born 1672; Martha, 1674; John, 1677; and Mercy, 1681." According to him, their ages in 1688 were about 16, 14, 11, and 7, respectively. The two statements agree as to Martha, John, and Mercy; but one makes the fourth, a boy of 5, named Benjamin, while the other's fourth is a boy of 16, named Nathaniel.

We have not sought for data on which to either confirm or correct the statement of either author. To show that they were young, is all that our present purpose requires.

More than seventy years subsequent to the occurrences in the Goodwin family and to the manifestations at Salem, Hutchinson said, "It seems at this day with some people, perhaps but few, to be the question whether the _accused_ or the _afflicted_ were under a preternatural or diabolical possession, rather than whether the afflicted were under bodily distempers, or altogether guilty of fraud and imposture." Poole, having quoted the above, makes the following sensible query and comment. "Why make an alternative? Both accusers and accused were generally possessors of NOT _bodily distemper_, but of _peculiar susceptibilities growing naturally from their special organisms and temperaments_, and were probably as free from and as much addicted to fraud and imposture, as the average of the community in which they lived."

If we read Hutchinson aright, he stated that a few people, even at his day, were believers that there had formerly been some "preternatural or diabolical" inflictions, but were in doubt whether such inflictions came upon the accusers or upon the accused; while, in his opinion, all ought to drop belief in anything preternatural or diabolical in the case, and seek only to determine whether the strange phenomena resulted partly from _bodily distempers_, or were exclusively frauds and impostures. We think he made no alternative himself between accusers and accused, but exempted both cla.s.ses from supermundane influences, and queried only whether witchcraft resulted partly from ill health or wholly from fraud. Be it so or not, Poole's comment is appropriate, instructive, and valuable. It is in harmony with the view which the present work is specially designed to ill.u.s.trate. We repeat and adopt his words, and say that "both accusers and accused were generally possessors of _not_ bodily distemper, but of peculiar susceptibilities growing naturally from their organisms and temperaments," and in general character were on a par with their neighbors.

Hutchinson's account of the family now under consideration is as follows:--

"In 1687 or 1688 began a more alarming instance than any which preceded it. Four children of John Goodwin, a grave man, a good liver, at the north part of Boston, were generally believed to be bewitched. I have often heard persons who were of the neighborhood speak of the great consternation it occasioned. The children were all remarkable for ingenuity of temper, had been religiously educated, and were thought to be without guile. The eldest was a girl of thirteen or fourteen years. She had charged a laundress with taking away some of the family linen. The mother of the laundress was one of the wild Irish, of bad character, and gave the girl harsh language; soon after which she fell into fits, which were said to have something diabolical in them. One of her sisters and two brothers followed her example, and it is said were tormented in the same parts of their bodies at the same time, although kept in separate apartments and ignorant of one another's complaints. One or two things were said to be very remarkable: all their complaints were in the daytime, and they slept comfortably all night: they were struck dead at the sight of the a.s.sembly's Catechism, Cotton's Milk for Babes, and some other good books, but could read in Oxford's Jests, Popish and Quaker books, and the Common Prayer without any difficulty. Is it possible that the mind of man should be capable of such strong prejudices as that a suspicion of fraud should not immediately arise? But attachments to modes and forms in religion had such force that some of these circ.u.mstances seem rather to have confirmed the credit of the children. Sometimes they would be deaf, then dumb, then blind; and sometimes all these disorders together would come upon them. Their tongues would be drawn down their throats, then pulled out upon their chins. Their jaws, necks, shoulders, elbows, and all their joints would appear to be dislocated, and they would make most piteous outcries of burnings, of being cut with knives, beat, &c., and the marks of wounds were afterward to be seen. The ministers of Boston and Charlestown kept a day of fasting and prayer at the troubled house; after which the youngest child made no more complaints. The others persevered, and the magistrates then interposed, and the old woman was apprehended; but upon examination would neither confess nor deny, and appeared to be disordered in her senses. Upon the report of physicians that she was _compos mentis_ she was executed, declaring at her death the children should not be relieved. The eldest, after this, was taken into a minister's family, where at first she behaved orderly, but after a time suddenly fell into her fits. The account of her affliction is in print; some things are mentioned as extraordinary which tumblers are every day taught to perform, others seem more than natural; but it was a time of great credulity. The children returned to their ordinary behavior, lived to adult age, made profession of religion, and the affliction they had been under they publicly declared to be one motive to it. One of them I knew many years after. She had the character of a very virtuous woman, and never made any acknowledgment of fraud in the transaction."

This historian was born more than twenty years after the "great consternation" which the Goodwin case occasioned, and therefore those must have been elderly people who gave him accounts of personal remembrance of it, and rehea.r.s.ed to him their mellowed recollections of the past. From such people he had probably heard many particulars, and received general impressions which were one source from whence he drew materials for his history, at least for his comments; also opinions then prevalent around him were aids to his judgment when reading Mather's account. He omitted to express directly any doubt as to the occurrence of such facts as the records presented, but innuendoed, all through his account, that fraud, acting upon credulity, begat and brought forth that entire brood of marvels. He left us the facts, and stated that the children were "all remarkable for ingenuity of temper." Probably his meaning is, that they were remarkably bright or quick-witted. The historian adds, that they "had been religiously educated, and were thought to be _without guile_." These are points of interest both as items on which public judgment concerning the facts was based at the time of their occurrence, and also as things to be regarded by moderns when attempting to determine the probability whether such marvels were produced voluntarily by embodied actors alone, or by force exerted upon and through mortal forms by wills putting forth power from imperceptible sources.

What do the quoted statements indicate as to the const.i.tutional endowments and acquired skill of those children for purposely acting out the feats ascribed to them? Ready wit, sprightliness, or whatever is meant by "ingenuity of temper," was a very good basis for any kind of performances; but the character of the doings likely to proceed from that basis in a given case, will be indicated by other possessions. Religious education and freedom from guile are not very probable prompters of either egregious trickery, or prolonged and mischievous imposture. Hutchinson's remark that "some things are mentioned as extraordinary which tumblers are every day taught to perform," is doubtless true; but he adds that "others seem more than natural." Yes, they do. And it is these especially that the world desires to see traced to competent performers. How did the historian account for such--for those seeming "more than natural"? Solely by the dogmatic remark that "it was a time of great credulity." What if it was?

Could credulity in the public mind enable untrained children to outact jugglers, tumblers, and most efficient dissemblers and tricksters of various kinds in their special vocations? What did the historian mean by alleging _credulity_ in way of accounting for facts which he adduced, and left without direct controversion, or any attempt at such? Was he intimating that belief of the actual occurrence of such facts, though witnessed through many months by the physical senses of mult.i.tudes, argued credulity? If so, he put upon the word _credulity_ an inadmissible meaning.